Editorial: Homework for the parents

Friday, Oct. 12, 2007 | 7:23 a.m.

You hear it all the time in casual comments and read it all the time in formal studies - children get more out of school if their parents are involved.

It is an easy premise to preach. In practice it becomes harder. With both parents apt to be putting in long hours at work, what can a schoolteacher do to bring about genuine involvement?

One New Jersey literature teacher came up with an idea that appears to be successful. He started assigning weekly homework to the parents of his ninth graders.

The homework is based on the reading required of the children. To be sure parents complete their assignments, the teacher asks them to post comments on his blog.

"Parents complain about never getting to see their kids' work," Montclair High School teacher Damion Frye told The New York Times. "Now they have to."

Frye told the newspaper that in the three years he has been involving parents in this way, only one has flat-out refused to participate.

Many parents jump right in from the start ; others need time to overcome initial hesitancy or even resentment. The end result is that his blog is laden with comments, some in languages other than English and some which go on for "pages and pages."

Frye told the Times that his purpose is to inspire the involvement of parents throughout their children's high school years. Those are the years that many parents have trouble getting their children to open up about what they are doing in school.

We have long written about the importance of parents taking a real interest in their children's schoolwork. Support and encouragement at home go a long way toward improving grades at school.

In our view Frye has hit upon something that other upper-grade teachers might want to try.

If parents are posting comments on the same subjects their children are studying, can questions such as "So what did you think of that Whitman poem?" be far behind?